“House of India “is an engaging, sometimes quite funny, take on South Asian immigrants in the American Midwest. Set in the House of India, a traditional Indian restaurant in a dying strip mall in Akron, Ohio, the play takes a lens to authenticity and the people trying to achieve it.
Ananya (Mahira Kakkar) opened the restaurant thirty years before with her late husband, now memorialized in a portrait in the restaurant. She is helped by her daughter Vaidehi (Supriya Ganesh) and Jacob (Tommy Bo), who is part family, part outsider.
The restaurant has fallen on hard times, and Jacob enthusiastically encourages Ananya to enhance the menu by fusing Indian and Mexican cuisines. She listens skeptically but is not convinced. Vaidehi supports her mother, and Jacob is outvoted (again).
This dynamic might have continued for years but for a jarring incident and the return of Vikram (Deven Kolluri) Ananya’s son. He had left three years earlier, after the father died, and is returning for specious reasons.
Vikram is writing a book about the family and the restaurant and needed to come home for more “research.” Ananya is elated to see her son, obviously the golden child. Vaidehi is pissed. Jacob is uncharacteristically reserved.
Backed into a corner after the incident, the family, particularly Ananya and Vaidehi, must choose how best to revitalize the restaurant – or not.
This genre of immigrant story is fairly common, and “House of India” embraces the appropriate themes: intergenerational conflict; the ongoing struggles with economics and racism; trying to fit into a changing world. The show doesn’t really offer anything new, but it repackages those tropes quite thoughtfully and produces some pretty sturdy laughs.
The cast does a great job. Bo is fantastic as the striving Jacob and Ganesh provides a telling counterpoint in Vaidehi’s sullen anger. Kakkar stands out as the matriarch trying to hold everything together. She doesn’t like being rude, but she will not back down.
“House of India’s” worst flaw is that it does not stick the landing. The ending is abrupt, unexpected and not particularly satisfying. It seemed like the play had to make a quick exit to satisfy some nebulous time requirement.
Still, “House of India” is a smartly-written show with some truly delightful moments. I liked it; I just wanted to like it more.
